Back in March, we blogged about the Australian Government’s plans to amend the Trade Marks Act 1995 (Cth) (Act) to make it easier to remove trade marks not in use from the register. On 24 August 2018, the Intellectual Property Laws Amendment (Productivity Commission Response Part 1 and Other Measures) Act 2018 received Royal Assent and will soon bring these changes into effect.

A trade mark may be removed from the register in relation to particular good/services if the trade mark has not been used in Australia, in good faith, for such good/services for a continuous period of three years. Previously, an application for removal could only be made once five years after the relevant trade mark’s filing date had passed. Section 93(2) of the Act will be amended so that an application may be made once three years after the filing date has passed.

It is hoped that these changes will reduce ‘clutter’ on the register and disincentivize bad faith applications filed without any genuine intention to use the relevant marks in trade.

The amendments will come into effect on a date to be fixed by Proclamation or (at the very latest) 25 February 2019.